Project description
The role of parabiotics in dental health
Parabiotics impart an array of health-promoting properties. While parabiotics (in appropriate doses) have demonstrated benefits in various medical fields, they have yet to be tested in the field of oral health. The EU-funded INPAROL project will produce innovative parabiotics through ultrasound technology from mixed strains of probiotics used in commercial products. The project will assess the effects of these probiotics by antimicrobial testing against oral pathogens and in varied environmental conditions, and subject the best performing parabiotics to biofilm assays replicating oral conditions and toxicity assays. INPAROL will monitor the molecular changes to inflammatory mediators with complex in vitro infection models.
Objective
Oral diseases constitute an increased major public health burden. Alternative dental prevention and therapeutic approaches such as probiotics are gaining popularity, but partly due to these products being live bacteria their use has not gained significant popularity in dentistry. Parabiotics in appropriate doses have been shown to induce health benefits in other medical fields but have only as yet been tested sparingly for dental use.
INPAROL aims at producing innovative parabiotics through ultrasound technology from mixed strains of probiotics used in commercial products. INPARAOL probiotics’ effects will be assessed by antimicrobial testing against oral pathogens (single and mixed culture) and also following exposure to varied environmental conditions. Best performing parabiotics will be subjected to biofilm assays replicating oral conditions and toxicity assays, in vitro cell monolayers and in vivo zebrafish embryo models, will be performed. Finally, the molecular changes of changes to inflammatory mediators will be monitored with complex in vitro infection models.
Overall, this is the first time parabiotics for oral health application will be produced with the proposed methods which makes this research so niche. My strong clinical and microbiology research background makes INPAROL an ideal fit. I will be joined by a strong supervisory team at the University of Malta consisting of a renowned microbiologist and co-supervised by a world-leader on innovative antimicrobial approaches from the Academic Medical Centre, Amsterdam. INPAROL affords an unprecedented opportunity to build on my expertise to kick-start an independent research path in oral health research.
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MSCA-IF - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF)Coordinator
2080 MSIDA
Malta